What does everyone know or think about unschooling?

Question

I just started homeschooling. I am reading a book on this approach to schooling and it is very interesting. I just want other opinions or any knowledge on the subject.

Answer 1

i think its good. they teach so much bs in school that it would be far better to have someone/or yourself teach what you should know rather than useless c**p like columbus discovering america and so on.

Answer 2

Any alternative to the current state of public education is a good one.  I understand that it works well when a neighborhood provides a kind of home schooling for all the kids.  There's a school up the coast from here (Portland, ME) called the Toddy Pond School that is a great model for this kind of expanded home school.  I'm sure it is easy to find on the net.

Answer 3

Unschooling covers a broad range from loosely structured to completely unstructured.

The method of education you should use for your child depends upon their personality, abilities, and interests. Everyone should learn the three R's but for a child who is self motivated and seeks out information on his or her own unschooling may be a good option. Children who are less motivated and those with many learning disabilities often require a more structured approach.

Answer 4

I don't quite know what unschooling is, but this is n reply to the first comment, the discovery of the Americas by Christopher Columbus is not useless B.S, but rather a significant part of world history, let alone American history. And as a student at the University of Southern California in the midst of a required course on "cultural encounters in the age of exploration." Which has included the discovery of the Americas by Columbus and the conquest of Mexico City by Cortes.

It is vital to have a good understanding of our past in able to move on into our future.

But my own personal opinion on the subject of home schooling is that whilst I fully understand the reasoning behind it, the children are missing out on a vital part of life. They are not gaining that social contact that is required for all individuals. And whilst I'm sure someone will get all annoyed and adamantly refuse this statement there is a lot of evidence to show that in alot of cases this is so. Why do you think for college admittance there are extra questions for home-schooled kids.

Answer 5

Southbound has the wrong idea of what unschooling is.

There must be a real interest in alternative  home schooling, yes, there is more than one way, and not even one home school family; unschooling or not does things the same way.

I will copy, and paste one of my previous answers about what unschooling can look like.

Home schooling is teaching your children at home instead of using a conventional school, private, public, or charter to do it for you.

Home schooling gives the parent complete control over what is taught, as well as the time, place, and method used to do the teaching.

Both home schooling, and unschooling gives the parent the choice to go year round, or simply set their own schedule that is best for their families.

Children quickly gain the understanding that learning is not confined to a school, certain hours, or pre-selected books, but is a life long process, and has only those limitations that we ourselves place upon it, or allow others to place upon it.

Unschooling is not, at least not for us without guidance.

Children need guidance, and direction throughout their young lives to be able to learn, and develop character, and integrity.

Unschooling is a natural continuation of basic parenting, we simply add academics when they are ready.

Unschooling simply means learning in a natural setting, and using non-traditional means to teach.

Non-traditional meaning without an artificial school setting, either in a conventional school, or at home.

Unschooling uses many media, and some, but rarely traditional school text books, much of the learning is hands on, by working along side the adults, through 4H, and other organizations that have hands on training.

We use 4H for all our electives, as well as speech and debate. (Toast Masters).

Unschooling is learning by doing, not just reading about it.

We learn math, reading, and writing in a more structured (traditional) setting once they are between 6 and 10, but it depends on the child.

In the earlier years they learned writing their letters in shaving cream on the kitchen counter top, and they learned it was a lot of fun to learn.

We also went outside, and used side walk chalk, window finger paint and so on to learn writing, and shapes.

Before they knew it they were able to write, no muss no fuss.

We use a lot of games, board games, computer software, or outdoor games.

See this web site what is available for games, and you will see learning does not have to be confined to a textbook.

http://www.educationallearninggames.com/...

Unschooling can be completely, or to some extend be child directed, and this; at least for us; means that when our children come to a particular subject that they want to learn about, we do not put a time limit on them as to how long they can learn about it, we simply try to provide every opportunity they need to learn as much as they want too.

Most often when children are allowed to learn in a natural way, in the form of unschooling, relaxed, Montessori, or self directed learning, they understand the concepts better, and score high on any (academic) test they are given.

Hands on teaching, instructors who are experienced in their field, from a car mechanic, pilot, store clerk, to a doctor; if these are willing to answer childrens questions and children would be incouraged to ask questions freely; can teach more in 15 minutes than textbooks, and hours in classrooms could accomplish.

For some other sources to research the many faces of unschooling see:

Click on the little purple box to view the video for free.

http://www.raisingsmallsouls.com/

Click on home school methods, and than unschooling.

http://homeschooling.gomilpitas.com/

http://www.unschooling.com/

http://www.livefreelearnfree.net/index.h...

Answer 6

We're unschoolers.

Unschoolers practise child-led education and are generally focused strongly on education, *NOT* schooling. Unschoolers reject everything that conventional schools stand for. We don't do any tests or exams (unless one of us kids decides we want to); we don't follow a curriculum or syllabus or schedule and we don't bother with grades or marks or any such concepts as passing and failing. I know some unschoolers, in places like parts of the US that have mandatory testing, take the tests just to keep the "powers-that-be" happy but then don't bother getting the results.

Y'know the french have a proverb: "En forgeant on devient forgeron" which, in English, means "By working at the forge, one becomes a blacksmith". Or in other words, you don't become a blacksmith (or pretty much anything else in this world!) by sitting in a classroom at school for 6 hours a day, 5 days a week for 12 years of your life. Unschoolers generally believe that "working at the forge" (ie learning from real life/real world situations and not from artificial classroom/textbook based learning) is what constitutes education.

Answer 7

Just about eveyrthing I am today came from unschooling.

Some came from homeschooling.

The rudiements came from brick schools.  I learned numbers, math, reading and writing in brick schools.  I learned pastics in brick schools  Not much else.

My unschooling in observational astronomy got me published in Sky and Telescope at the age of 16.

My unschooling in audio, film, music and television got my work on international radio with ASCAP current airplay status, royalties, on regional Television.

My unschooling in photography got me Management posistions with retail and wholesale firms.  It also got me published in newspapers and magazines.

My unschooling in graphics and design got a lot of artists and talents noticed with the work I did in flyers, promotional materials, etc.

My unschooling in computer programming generated the WORLD'S FIRST NO CODE WEB PAGE MAKER in the 1990s long before there was a Front Page or Dream Weaver and it was helping 10 year old students, teachers and ministers put things on the WEB in the 1990s

My time and charges program got written up in a Hong Kong journal in the 1990s

My CD cover maker was a best seller for me and paid for a lot of my software and internet expenses.

It also allowed Musicians, Software producers, Video producers and Models to make CD covers with pictures, titles, credits, logos and copyright notices with NO graphics experience.

Unschooling is really not understood very well.

It is not getting a tutorial and following it step by step.  THAT is homeschooling.

It is getting a reference book and using it when you slam into a brick wall.

The rest of the time you are flying by the seat of your pants.

You understand how your programming langauge works and you say

I want to design a text processor so you teach yourself how to do JUSTIFICATION and WORD WRAP by creating your OWN algorithms, not copied from a book, but from your BRAIN from your understanding of programming functions and how the results are supposed to be.

You don't ask people how to do it, you figure out for yourself and use the REFERENCE book or a BLOG when you slam into a BRICK WALL.

Then you look for a piece of advise to set you back on track again.

I slamed in and welcome some consulling, on my video book on how 1" C or EBU composites the color.

I know how VHS, S-VHIS and U-Matic composites things, but I can find NO REFERENCE about 1" C or EBU 1"

Nor can I find how 2" Quad when from monchrome to color and how that process actually occurs.

Those are brick walls.

I keep looking for a reference or someone who knows it intimately, but have yet to find it.

I keep finding new tid bits on how Techolor 3 strip works and they vary from what I was taught in college radically.

See, you dig enough and you find out what you were told WRONG in COLLEGE or in BRICK SCHOOL because you are taught by someone who was taught, but he wasn't taught by someone who knew or worked with it.  He was taught from a book.

Books are sometimes wrong.

That is where SCHOOLING and HOMESCHOOLING go astray and UNSCHOOLING or diging holes in the ground until your uncover AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE about reality shines.

Unschooling is what they do in REAL work in science.  In Masters and Doctorial dissertation work.

Unschooling is about getting your hands dirty digging holes to findout what's is ACTUALLY underneath it all, because you don't want to totally beleive what the BOOK says is there.

Answer 8

Kids need structure and instruction. Unschooling might be good for teaching your kids now, but it's not applicable to the real world. It's going to be a big shock to unschooled children when they go off to college and realize they are not going to be taught according to how and when they want to be taught.

There is a reason certain things are taught in regular schools and if you are going to teach at home you should model what is done in regular schools. If a child doesn't want to learn math, then too bad--he still needs to learn it.

If you're going to unschool, you might as well unparent as well, right? I mean, if kids are capable of deciding what is important to learn then are they not capable of deciding what rules are good? What bed time is right for them? What they should eat for dinner?

Answer 9

I haven't researched it and I'm not knocking it at all. But I just don't see how kids can learn by doing nothing.

How is just 'doing whatever' going to get kids to learn the basic educational things in life?

Spelling, math, reading, etc?

More power to whoever does this, but I just don't agree with it.

Answer 10

I think it is a good idea.  It would not work for our family because we are a two income family and in my opinion, you would need a parent to help direct and redirect you in your interests.  I am a fan on Dayna Martin and think she has some wonderful ideas.  I just don't have faith enough to step out in that direction.

Answer 11

As for what the first poster commented.

Why wouldnt you want to learn about the history of your country. Thats not useless c**p. Its part of what made your country great.

I dont really have formal opinions on unschooling.

I recently posted a question about what the differnce is. One lady said she knows a 12 year old who cant read yet, he wants to learn but his mum wont teach him as he needs to teach himself???????

Does this mean that they get 'left behind"....?